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MEMORIAL    SERVICES 


UPON   THE   SEVENTY-FOURTH   BIRTHDAY   OF 

%  ;*•.:*•; 


WENDELL   PHILLIPS, 


HELD   AT   THE   RESIDENCE   OF 


WILLIAM   SUMNER  CROSBY, 


No.  517  BROADWAY,  SOUTH  BOSTON,  Nov.  29™,  1885. 


printeb  for  private  Circulation  only. 


BOSTON: 

PRINTED    BY    JAMES    COOPER, 

No.  29  OLIVER  STREET. 

MDCCCLXXXVI. 


Peace  if  possible ; 
Justice  at  any  rate. 

WENDELL  PHILLIPS. 


INCIDENTAL    PROCEEDINGS. 


ON  the  evening  of  the  seventy-fourth  birthday  of  Wendell 
Phillips,  November  29,  1885,  a  large  number  of  his  friends 
assembled  in  the  parlors  of  William  Sumner  Crosby,  in  South 
Boston,  to  render  in  reverent  love  and  admiration  their  homage  to 
his  character,  and  to  commemorate  by  memorial  services  his  life 
long  consecration  to  universal  humanity  in  its  extremest  needs. 

It  was  peculiarly  fitting  that  the  memorial  address  should  be 
given  by  Theodore  D.  Weld  —  one  of  the  last  of  the  early  aboli 
tionists,  and  the  life-long  friend  of  Wendell  Phillips.  Among  the 
hundred  guests  present  were  — 

THE  REV.  BROOKE  HERFORI). 

HON.  JAMES   M.  BUFFUM. 

THE  REV.  M.  J.   SAVAGE. 

MR.  HENRY  B.  BLACKWKLL. 

DR.  DAVID  THAYER  (Mr.  Phillips's  physician). 

DR.  JOHN  P.    REYNOLDS  (Mr.  Phillips's  nephew). 

MR.   WILLIAM   WARREN  (the  comedian,  who  "  never  missed  an  oppor. 

tunity  in  thirty  years  to  hear  Mr.  Phillips/'). 
THE  REV.  FR.  CORCORAN. 
THE  REV.  GEO.  H.  YOUNG. 
MR.  M.  ANAGNOS. 
THE  REV.  PITT  DILLINGHAM. 
MR.  JOHN  W.  HUTCHINSON  (the  last  of  the   Hutc  hinson  fam.iy  of 

singers). 

MR.  J.  M.  W.  YERRINGTON  (the  reporter  of  Mr.  Phillips's  speeches). 
MR.  WILLIAM  LLOYD  GARRISON. 
MR.  A.  H.  GRIMKfi  (Mr.  Phillips's  eulogist  at  Tremont  Temple,  April  9, 

1884). 

THE  REV.  EDWARD  F.  HAYWARD. 
THE  REV.  WILLIAM  H.   SAVARY. 
MR.  E.  T.  BILLINGS  (the  portrait  artist). 
THE  REV.  WM.  H.  LYON. 
MR.  THOMAS  HILLS 
Miss  ABBY  W.  MAY. 
Miss  ALICE  STONE  BLACKWELL. 
THE  REV.  CHRISTOPHER  R.  ELIOT 
THE  REV.  C.  B.  ELDER. 


989602 


Mr.  Crosby,  who  presided,  opened  the  exercises  by  reading  the 
twenty-third  Psalm  from  a  Bible,  a  present  of  Mr.  Phillips's  mother 
to  her  son,  and  given  by  him  to  Mrs.  Crosby  a  short  time  before 
his  death.  Mr.  Crosby  also  read  the  twelfth  verse  of  the  fifteenth 
chapter  o  First  Corinthians  :  — 

"Now  IF  CHRIST  BE  PREACHED  THAT  HE  ROSE  FROM 

THE   DEAD,    HOW   SAY   SOME  AMONG   YOU    THAT    THERE    IS 
NO    RESURRECTION    OF  THE   DEAD?" 

This  Psalm  and  this  verse  Mr.  Phillips  had  marked  in  the  Bibler 
and  requested  that  both  should  be  read  at  his  funeral. 

The  Broadway  Unitarian  Choir,  in  charge  of  Mr.  William  R. 
Baker,  then  sang  the  twenty-third  Psalm,  after  which  the  Rev.  M. 
J.  Savage  offered  the  following  prayer  : 

Father,  we  know  that  no  words  of  ours  can  adequately  name  Thee.  It  is 
Thy  might  in  the  infinite  universe  of  which  we  seem  so  small  a  part.  We 
are  overwhelmed  by  Thy  majesty  in  the  heavens  above  us,  and  lost  in  the 
mystery  of  Thy  presence  about  us  and  beneath  us.  But  though  Thou  art 
manifested  as  power  and  might  and  glory,  we  believe  also  that  there  is  that 
in  Thee  which  responds  to  our  trusting  hearts  when  we  call  Thee  "Our 
Father."  We  do  not  believe  our  cry  is  lost  in  empty  space ;  but  rather  that 
all  we  know  as  human  tenderness  and  pity  and  helpfulness  and  love  are  only 
finite  manifestations  of  what  is  infinite  in  Thee. 

We  do  not  pray  because  thou  needest  to  be  told  anything,  or  because  we 
think  we  can  persuade  Thee  to  be  kinder  than  Thou  already  art.  Did  we 
dream  that  our  prayers  had  power  to  interfere  with  or  alter  Thine  eternally 
wise  and  loving  purposes  we  should  not  dare  to  pray.  We  pray  because  we 
must,  pouring  out  our  inmost  hearts  before  Thee,  as  children  think  aloud 
their  childish  hopes  and  fears  in  the  presence  of  father  or  mother.  But 
chiefly  our  prayer  is  gratitude  and  trust. 

We  thank  Thee  that  man  has  always  been  feeling  after  Thee,  though 
sometimes  blindly  groping,  and  that  thou  hast  never  been  far  from  any  one 
of  us.  Thou  didst  seek  us  before  we  could  seek  Thee.  Forever  has  it  been 
true  that  Thou  hast  stood  at  the  door  and  knocked,  ready  at  the  opening  of 
the  door  to  come  in  and  abide  with  us.  As  fast  and  as  far  as  we  have 
made  room  for  Thee,  Thou  hast  come  into  the  brain  as  truth,  into  the  heart 
as  love,  and  into  the  life  as  noble  action. 

And  never  hast  Thou  left  any  age  without  a  witness  of  Thee,  a  teacher,  a 
leader,  an  inspiring  and  uplifting  power.  Always  has  some  noble  one  been 
Thy  voice,  calling  men  to  duty ;  always  has  some  seer  been  Thy  light  to 
show  the  way 


And  not  only  in  ancient  times  have  Thine  inspired  ones  spoken  Thy  truth 
to  the  world.  For  Thou  art  the  living  God  —  as  truly  living  and  leading  in 
the  grand  forward  and  upward  movements  of  the  modern  world  as  at  any 
period  in  the  past.  Thou  hast  sent  to  our  time  also  seers  and  prophets  to 
rouse  the  people  from  their  indifference,  and  to  lead  them  in  the  way  of 
righteousness.  In  our  day,  as  well  as  in  the  past,  hast  Thou  sent  a  voice 
to  cry  in  the  wilderness,  "  Prepare  ye  the  way  of  the  Lord !  "  In  our  day,  as 
we  as  in  the  past,  hast  thou  sent  one  to  undo  the  heavy  burdens,  to  proclaim 
liberty  to  the  captive,  and  to  break  the  shackles  of  them  that  were  bound. 

And  to-night  we  especially  thank  Thee  for  him  whom  we  are  gathered  to 
commemorate ;  —  for  his  clear  eye  that  saw  the  truth,  for  his  brave  heart 
that  did  not  falter,  and  for  his  disturbing  voice  that  would  not  cry  peace  so 
long  as  the  people  were  at  rest  in  the  wrong. 

May  we  prove  worthy  of  the  honor  we  pay  to  him  by  being  ourselves  true 
to  the  duty  that  calls  to  us  to-day.  May  we  render  him  no  mere  lip-homage  ; 
but,  in  his  spirit,  do  the  work  that  this  hour  needs.  So  shall  we  make  our 
own  lives  his  fitting  monument,  and  carry  on  still  further  the  work  of  human 
deliverance  and  uplifting  to  which  he  devoted  his  life. 

Thus  shall  come  on  earth  "  the  kingdom  of  God,"  that  is  the  kingdom 
of  a  perfected  humanity.  When  that  grand  consummation  is  reached,  may 
we  be  fit  to  join  in  the  paean  of  victory  because  we  have  done  some  little 
thing  at  least  to  help  on  that  victory.  And  Thine  shall  be  the  honor  and 
the  glory  forever  and  ever.  Amen  ! 

At  the  close  of  this  prayer  the  Choir  chanted  : 

If  I  were  a  voice,  a  persuasive  voice, 

That  could  travel  the  wide  world  through, 

I  would  fly  on  the  beams  of  the  morning  light, 

And  speak  to  men  with  a  gentle  might, 

And  bid  them  to  be  true. 

I  would  fly,  I  would  fly  over  land  and  sea, 

Wherever  a  human  heart  might  be, 

Telling  a  tale,  or  singing  a  song, 

In  praise  of  the  right  —  in  blame  of  t,he  wrong. 

If  I  were  a  voice,  a  consoling  voice, 

I'd  fly  on  the  wings  of  the  air; 

The  homes  of  sorrow  and  guilt  I'd  seek, 

And  calm  and  truthful  words  I'd  speak, 

To  save  them  from  despair. 

I  would  fly,  I  would  fly  o'er  the  crowded  town 

And  drop  like  the  happy  sunshine  down 

Into  the  hearts  of  suffering  men, 

And  teach  them  to  look  up  again. 


If  I  were  a  voice,  an  immortal  voice, 

I  would  fly  the  earth  around, 

And  wherever  man  unto  error  bow'd 

I'd  publish  in  notes  both  long  and  loud 

The  truth's  most  joyful  sound. 

I  would  fly,  I  would  fly  on  the  wings  of  day, 

Proclaiming  peace  on  my  world-wide  way, 

Bidding  the  saddened  ones  rejoice  — 

If   T  were  a  voice  —  an  immortal  voice. 

Mr.  Crosby  then  read  letters  from  friends  of  Mr.  Phillips 
which  will  be  found  at  the  end  of  the  pamphlet. 

In  introducing  the  speaker  of  the  evening,  Mrs.  Crosby  said  : 

I  have  great  pleasure  in  presenting  to  you  Mr.  Theodore  D. 
Weld.  At  the  age  of  eighty-two  he  comes  to  speak  to  us  as  no 
living  man  can  of  Wendell  Phillips.  Mr.  Phillips  always  spoke  of 
him  as  the  most  eloquent  and  impressive  of  the  early  anti-slavery 
orators,  and  cherished  for  him  always  the  closest  friendship  and 
most  reverential  regard.  Let  us  never  forget  how  much  we  owe  to 
him  and  his  noble  wife,  Angelina  Grimke". 

The  exercises  closed  by  the  Choir  singing  Rev,  M.  J.  Savage's 
"Ode  to  Truth":— 

I. 

No  power  on  earth  can  sever 
My  soul  from  truth  forever  — 
In  whatever  path  she  wanders, 
I'll  follow  mv  commander. 
All  hail  !     All  hail  !  beloved  Truth  ! 

II. 

Whate'er  the  foe  before  me, 

Where'er  the  flag  flies  o'er  me, 

I'll  stand  and  never  falter, 

No  bribe  my  faith  shall  alter. 

Lead  on  !     Lead  on  !  thou  mighty  Truth 

III. 

And  when  the  fight  is  over, 
Look  down  upon  thy  lover, 
He  asks,  for  well-done  duty, 
To  see  thy  heav'nly  beauty. 
Reveal  thy  face,  celestial  Truth 


ADDRESS. 


LESSONS  FROM  THE  LIFE  OF  WENDELL  PHILLIPS. 


OF  all  greatness,  the  greatest  is  a  great  soul,  great  in  the  divine 
self-forgetting,  that  lives  for  others,  to  cheer,  cherish  and  uplift,  to 
help,  befriend,  bless  and  save ;  lives  to  right  wrongs,  to  lighten 
burdens,  ease  pains,  assuage  ills,  and  calm  passions ;  ever  serving 
needs  and  soothing  griefs ;  glad  in  others'  joy,  sharing  others' 
woe ;  in  all  doing,  daring,  and  self-sacrifice  consecrated  to  univer 
sal  right,  truth,  duty,  aspiration,  and  progress. 

Such  souls  recast  the  race,  illumine  and  inspire  it ;  wake  up  its 
latent  life,  and  launch  it  into  noble  action.  They  marshall  its 
array,  lead  its  advance,  and  beat  the  time  of  its  movement  as  it 
marches  on.  Their  voices  ring  out  the  glad  tidings,  that  the  old 
earth's  hoary  wrongs  pass  fast  away,  and  fast  the  new  earth  cometh 
wherein  dwelleth  righteousness. 

They  are  God's  embassadors.  His  credentials,  written  out  on 
their  lives,  are  His  loving  despatches  to  the  children  of  His  care. 
Born  with  these  gifts  and  graces,  they  are  saviours  by  birthright, 
commissioned  to  breathe  through  all  their  breath  of  life,  giving 
eyes  to  the  blind,  feet  to  the  lame,  speech  to  the  dumb,  healing  to 
the  bruised  and  broken,  freedom  to  the  slave,  succor  to  the 
tempted,  rescue  to  the  wandering,  and  to  the  lost  safe  guidance 
home  to  their  Father's  house. 


8 

They  are  humanity's  pathfinders,  exploring  its  way ;  engineers 
drawing  its  lines  and  laying  its  course;  pioneers  casting  up  its 
highway  and  smoothing  the  rugged  route ;  torchbearers,  lighting, 
guiding,  and  cheering  it  on ;  guardian-angels  hovering  over  it  by 
day  with  songs  of  deliverance,  and  by  night  encamping  found 
about  it  in  loving  watch  and  ward. 

They  open  for  its  thirst  fountains  in  the  desert,  and  minister  to 
its  hunger  that  mystic  manna,  which  to  the  faithful  never  faileth. 

Such  souls  are  God's  apostles  to  man,  buoying  him  upward  by 
the  inspiration  of  their  lives,  and  quickening  torpid  natures  by  the 
magnetism  of  supernal  ideas. 

Thus  from  age  to  age  they  have  been  his  pilots  through  night 
and  storm,  over  raging  seas ;  pioneers  out  of  Egypt's  bondage 
through  the  wilderness  to  the  promised  land. 

Fifty-six  years  ago,  just  such  a  soul,  the  moral  hero  of  his  time, 
bearing  God's  mandates  to  this  slave-holding  nation  and  church, 
its  abject  ally,  went  forth  thus  commissioned.  Alone,  God-sent, 
he  lifted  up  his  prophecy  against  a  generation  of  oppressors,  dead 
in  trespasses  and  sins. 

Far  and  long  his  warning  voice  rang  out,  "Repent !"  "Break 
every  yoke  !  "  Let  the  oppressed  go  free  !  "  His  trumpet-blast 
died  in  the  dull  ears  of  a  besotted  nation  and  church.  To  them 
he  seemed  as  one  who  mocked. 

At  length  here  and  there  a  kindred  soul  —  a  man,  a  woman  — 
caught  his  inspiration.  Those  near  pressed  around  him ;  those 
afar  shouted  back  their  glad  all-hail. 

Very  slowly  their  numbers  grew.  At  length,  after  years  of 
struggle,  the  charmed  circle  widened,  till  thousands  wrought  exult 
ing  together. 

Then  came  among  them  one  in  earliest  manhood,  whose  fervent 
soul  drew  him  by  irrepressible  affinities  to  the  leader's  side. 


9 

Thenceforth  they  twain  were  one.  Together  with  equal  step  they 
marched,  leading  the  van  in  a  moral  warfare  against  infinite  odds. 

Divinely  they  magnified  their  office.  How  they  wrought,  wrote, 
spoke,  lived,  agonized  and  conquered  ! 

No  lips  so  touched  by  altar-coals  as  theirs,  no  pens  like  theirs 
flashed  truth's  electric  fires,  till,  life's  last  forces  spent,  they  rested 
from  their  labors ;  and  in  might  and  multitude  their  works  have 
followed  them,  till  now,  from  sea  to  sea,  myriads  rise  up  and  call 
them  blessed. 

Let  us  for  this  hour  commune  with  the  younger  of  these  anoint 
ed  souls  as  he  traversed  his  great  career.  A  life  wrought  out  in  all 
daring  and  sacrifice  for  the  poorest  of  earth's  poor,  desolate  out 
casts,  guiltless  victims,  the  plundered  and  forsaken  of  every  realm. 

A  life  so  sublime  in  its  devotion  to  man's  intensest  needs  chal 
lenges  our  reverent  pondering  of  the  lessons  it  teaches. 

Twenty-two  months  ago  all  of  Wendell  Phillips  that  could  die 
was  borne  to  Boston's  most  ancient  place  of  burial.  There,  at  the 
centre  of  the  old  puritan  city,  his  majestic  form,  lowered  tenderly 
to  its  final  rest,  sleeps  with  his  kindred  dust.  Yet  this  lapse  of 
time  has  hardly,  if  at  all,  dulled  that  keen  sense  of  loss  borne  to  us 
upon  his  latest  breath. 

No  event,  topic,  or  name  lives  more  vividly  to-day  in  the  best 
thought  and  heart  of  his  native  New  England  than  the  memory  of 
that  grand  career.  Pulpits,  platforms  and  the  press  have  lavished 
spontaneous  homage  upon  his  genius  and  character. 

From  ocean  to  ocean,  cities,  villages  and  hamlets,  even  the  thinly 
peopled  frontiers  skirting  our  far  West  and  North,  uprose,  uncov 
ered  as  the  wires  sped  on  those  drear  death-tidings ;  while  with 
choked  utterance  those  whose  hearts  his  life  had  won  whispered 
brokenly  the  name  they  loved. 

Even  the  late  slave-holding  South  hushed  for  a  while  its  dis- 


10 

cordant  note,  while  some  in  New  Orleans,  Charleston  and  Rich 
mond  let  fall  tender  words  as  they  read  upon  their  bulletins, 
"  Wendell  Phillips  is  dead." 

But  it  was  not  his  genius  alone,  and  the  vast  service  it  had  ren 
dered  to  man,  that  kindled  this  loving  admiration.  They  who  out 
poured  those  eulogies  had  felt  the  thrill  of  his  heart-beat ;  its  pulses 
had  throbbed  through  them  in  words  that  burned.  Thus  inspired 
they  spake. 

What  our  common  speech  calls  genius  is  some  special  faculty 
overshadowing  all  others  and  ruling  the  realm  of  mind. 

Not  such  was  the  genius  of  Wendell  Phillips.  It  was  no  king 
over  his  other  powers,  but  a  ruler  among  rulers,  each  co-ordinate 
with  each  in  a  balanced  equality.  It  was  no  single  element,  but 
all  the  higher  elements  forming  a  common  unit,  equal  forces 
blended  in  an  inseparable  whole.  Some  minds  are  great  in  a 
single  faculty;  others  in  kindred  faculties  with  mutual  affinities; 
others  still  in  the  general  range  and  elevation  of  all  the  higher 
powers. 

Such  pre-eminently  was  the  genius  of  Wendell  Phillips.  Strong 
in  each  of  its  elements,  ethic,  aesthetic,  logical,  philosophic,  criti 
cal,  emotional,  imaginative,  all  these  with  conscience  and  indomita 
ble  will  were  the  rounded  man  himself.  The  large  stature  of  his 
powers,  their  exalted  level,  thus  making  each  a  vital  constituent  of 
his  genius,  made  him  in  their  combination  what  he  was. 

This  aggregation  ot  great  mental  and  moral  forces  crystallized 
into  character,  were  the  grand  way-marks  which  shaped  and  signal 
ized  his  life- career. 

Some  of  these  stand  out  so  far  in  front  that  each  seems  almost 
the  man  himself.  I  name  first,  intuitive  insight  into  rights  and 
wrongs,  the  nature,  relations  and  fitnesses  of  things. 

Second  :  An  absolute  self-poise,  never  jostled,  however  rude  the 


11 

shock  or  confounding  the  quandary,  whatever  friends  estranged 
or  associations  sundered. 

Third :  A  heroism  that  nothing  could  daunt,  converting  each 
danger  into  new  strength  to  dare. 

Fourth  :  A  serene  independence,  standing  upon  its  own  footing, 
\  and  content  to  stand  alone. 

^  Fifth  :  A  fidelity  to  conviction,  never  swerving  from  its  line  for 
cross,  loss,  struggle,  peril  or  self-sacrifice,  whatever  the  onset  or  the 
odds. 

Sixth  :  A  moral  courage  unmoved  by  scoff  or  taunt,  threats  or 
curses,  by  faces  averted  in  disgust  or  scowling  in  scorn,  pale  in  hate 
or  ablaze  with  rage,  while  calmly  confronting  stormy  clamor  and 
universal  ostracism. 

\  Seventh  :  All  these  elements  were  pioneered  by  a  conscience 
sensitive  as  quicksilver,  true  as  needle  to  pole,  impelled  to  univer 
sal  right  by  an  indomitable  will,  and  wrought  out  in  a  stringent  logic, 
philosophy  and  rhetoric,  compact  in  tersest  phrase,  proverb,  epi 
gram,  invective,  poetic  conception  and  eloquence ;  in  natural, 
simple  speech  of  common  words,  and  flowing  in  a  style  of  trans 
parent  strength  and  beauty. 

To  these  were  added  the  charm  of  rare  personal  attractions,  n 
majestic  presence,  an  air  of  blended  grace  and  dignity,  a  gentle, 
winning  manner,  with  never  a  trace  of  self-display,  or  hardly  of 
self-consciousness,  his  face  alive  with  soul,  his  eye  serenely  benig 
nant  to  right,  but  darting  lightnings  at  incorrigible  wrong,  his 
speech  resonant  with  those  wonderous  tones  which  once  heard 
were  heard  always ;  while  over  all  his  supremely  unselfish  life  was 
a  crown  of  glory. 

His  Boston  birth  was  to  him  a  cherished  boon.  Speaking  of  it 
he  said,  "  I  love  inexpressibly  the  streets  of  Boston,  over  which  my 
mother  bore  up  my  baby  feet,  and  if  God  grants  me  time  enough 


12 

I  will  make  them  too  pure  for  the  footsteps  of  a  slave."  When  an 
old  man  he  wrote,  "  I  was  born  in  Boston,  and  the  good  name  of 
the  old  town  is  bound  up  with  every  fibre  of  my  heart."  Why  did 
Boston  so  nestle  in  his  heart  ?  Not  because  it  was  renowned  for 
those  splendors  which  strike  the  eye,  marvels  which  have  made 
famous  many  cities.  In  those  scores  have  surpassed  Boston. 

It  was  because  the  grand  old  town  sat  crowned  with  glorious 
memories,  his  joy  and  pride.  While  life  lasted  they  stirred  him 
heart  and  brain. 

Boston's  sublime  example  in  extremest  peril,  when  every  portent 
foreboded  downfall,  in  the  grapple  with  England's  usurpation,  that 
grand  defiance  lived  deathless  in  his  memory,  and  cast  in  its  own 
mould  the  plastic  boyhood  of  the  young  devotee. 

That  old  heroic  mould  of  revolutionary  Boston  holds  its  own 
to-day,  and  will  ever,  despite  its  later  degeneracy.  True,  her  per 
fidy  to  liberty,  Oct.  2ist,  1835,  trailed  across  her  escutcheon,  spot 
less  till  then,  a  stain  indelible.  Yet  jet-black  as  that  stain  was  and 
will  be  forever,  it  can  never  dim  the  glory  of  Boston's  revolutionary 
renown.  That  grand  old  revolution,  its  thronging  difficulties  met 
and  mastered,  its  trials  and  struggles,  burdens  and  losses,  privations  , 
hardships  and  sufferings,  intense,  long-drawn  and  heroically  borne  ; 
its  dangers  confronted,  grappled  and  defiantly  dared ;  that  im 
mortal  seven-years'  struggle,  an  agony  of  desperation,  crowned 
victor  at  last,  while  the  land  still  smoked  with  slaughter,  these 
kindling  memories  were  all  household  words  in  the  diction  of  the 
heroic  boy. 

That  wonderous  story  his  heart  had  garnered  word  by  word.  To 
him  it  was  a  living  inspiration  in  all  the  air.  He  drew  it  in  with 
his  breath  and  thundered  it  forth  in  declamation  from  the  platform 
of  Boston's  Latin  School,  as  the  fiery  words  of  Otis,  Quincy,  Adams 
and  Patrick  Henry  leaped  glowing  from  his  fervid  lips. 


13 

But  though  by  birth  native  to  Boston,  and  counting  that  nativity 
a  precious  boon,  Wendell  Phillips  caught  in  his  earliest  young 
manhood  vivid  foregleams  of  a  higher  nativity  than  that  according 
to  the  flesh.  This  was  in  due  time  born  of  soul-travail  in  birth- 
throes  of  the  spirit.  Pondering  the  vision  and  biding  his  time,  he 
felt  within  him  new  yearnings,  his  inner  eye  fast  opening,  his  inner 
ear  unsealing,  his  whole  being  expanding  and  exulting  in  its  new 
found  inlets  and  outlets,  giving  it  freer  course,  fuller  pulses,  wider 
scope  and  higher  aspirations.  As  he  mused  there  came  to  him 
inklings  of  a  birthright  unknown  before.  Clearer  and  more  clear 
the  light  shone,  till  full-orbed  at  last  it  rose  upon  him,  revealing  his 
life- clientage  of  earth's  plundered  millions,  poorest  of  the  myriad 
poor,  victims  foredoomed  to  disfranchisement  from  birth,  dehu 
manized  by  human  laws,  whelmed  under  direst  wrongs,  stripped  of 
all  rights,  robbed  of  themselves  and  thus  of  all  besides,  the  tortured 
victims  of  all  atrocities  wrought  by  man  upon  man.  Forlorn,  out 
casts  !  desolate,  forsaken,  forgotten  and  left  to  perish  ! 

Thus  called  of  God  he  counselled  not  with  man.  Hailing  the 
vision,  he  bowed  to  its  sacred  baptism  and  felt  laid  upon  him  an 
ordaining  hand,  consecrate  with  the  anointing  of  a  divine  apostle- 
ship  to  bind  up  the  broken-hearted,  set  at  liberty  the  bruised, 
proclaim  deliverance  to  the  captive,  the  opening  of  prisons  to 
the  bond,  and  to  deliver  the  spoiled  out  of  the  hand  of  the 
oppressor. 

Straightway,  strong  of  heart,  he  girded  his  loins,  buckled  on  his 
armor  and  left  all,  looking  never  backward  except  in  joy  to  shout 
his  deliverance.  Then  exulting  in  his  summons,  his  mission  and 
his  message,  he  sprang  to  the  toils,  scorns,  perils,  alienations,  con 
flicts  and  hair-breadth  escapes  of  his  life-career. 

At  this,  his  first  great  crisis,  let  us  turn  back  to  note  the  special 
stages  which  marked  thus  far  the  scenes  of  his  life. 


14 

Born  November  29th,  1811,  he  graduated  at  fifteen  from  the 
Boston  Latin  School,  at  nineteen  from  Harvard  College. 

I  have  recently  received  letters  from  two  of  his  classmates,  de 
scribing  his  college-career.  The  first  is  from  his  roommate,  the 
Rev.  John  Tappan  Pierce,  of  Illinois. 

Mr.  Pierce  says  :  "  Our  acquaintance  began  at  Harvard  in  1827, 
when  we  first  met  to  be  examined.  I  was  then  a  lad  of  fifteen, 
but  two  weeks  younger  than  Phillips.  Though  I  had  never  seen 
him  before,  I  was  drawn  to  him  by  irresistible  attraction,  and  I 
always  found  him  true  as  magnet  to  steel.  I  had  engaged  a  room 
mate,  otherwise  we  should  have  roomed  together  the  first  year ; 
but,  just  before  entering  the  Sophomore  Class  in  1828,  Phillips 
came  to  my  room  and  proposed  our  partnership,  which  I  joyfully 
accepted  ;  and  here  began  our  life-intimacy,  a  sweet  and  enduring 
tie. 

"  I  will  speak  first  of  his  moral  traits.  He  was  not  then  a  profess 
ing  Christian,  yet  he  never  said  or  did  anything  unbecoming  the 
Christian  character.  What  President  Kirkland  said  in  his  life  of 
Fisher  Ames  was  eminently  true  of  Phillips  :  "  He  needed  not  the 
sting  of  guilt  to  make  him  virtuous."  His  character  shone  conspic 
uous.  He  was  above  pretence,  a  sincere,  conscientious,  devoted 
friend.  He  had  a  deep  love  for  all  that  was  true  and  honorable, 
always  detested  a  mean  action.  His  Bible  was  always  open  on  the 
centre-table.  His  character  was  perfectly  transparent ;  there  were 
no  subterfuges,  no  pretences  about  him.  He  was  known  by  all  to 
be  just  what  he  seemed. 

"  Second,  his  social  traits  :  He  was  the  favorite  of  the  class.  If 
any  class-honor  was  to  be  conferred,  who  so-  likely  to  have  it  as  he  ? 
Nor  would  any  dispute  his  claim.  Though  very  modest  in  his 
self-estimate,  every  one  willingly  yielded  him  the  palm.  Upon  the 
death  of  a  valued  classmate,  Thompson,  none  but  Phillips  must 
pronounce  the  eulogy. 


"  Third  :  His  standing  as  a  scholar  was  among  the  first  in  a  large 
class.  This  is  saying  not  a  little  when  we  recall  the  names  of 
Motley,  the  historian ;  Simmons,  the  distinguished  orator ;  Eames, 
United  States  charge"  d'affaires  ;  McKean,  a  true  son  of  genius  ;  the 
Rev.  Dr.  Morrison,  late  editor  of  the  "  Unitarian  Review ;"  Mayor 
Shurtleff,  and  Dr.  Shattuck,  of  Boston ;  Pickering,  the  Boston 
lawyer ;  Judge  Darrell,  of  New  Orleans  ;  Joseph  Williams,  Lieut.- 
Governor  of  Michigan  and  president  of  a  state  college  there. 

"  As  an  orator  Phillips  took  the  highest  stand  of  any  graduate  of 
our  day.  I  never  knew  him  to  fail  in  anything  or  hesitate  in  a 
recitation.  In  mathematics  he  was  facile  princeps;  natural  and 
moral  philosophy,  history,  the  ancient  languages,  in  all  pre 
eminent,  equally  good  in  all  branches. 

"  He  hated  oppression  and  always  defended  the  defenceless.  He 
had  great  power  of  reasoning,  and  easy  mastery  over  those  with 
whom  he  grappled.  He  was  laborious,  patient  under  trials,  and  of 
a  cheerful  disposition  that  could  never  be  discouraged." 

Another  of  his  classmates,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Morrison,  speaks  thus  of 
him  :  "  Wendell  Phillips  in  college  and  Wendell  Phillips  six  years 
after  were  entirely  different  men.  In  college  he  was  the  proud 
leader  of  the  aristocracy.  From  what  he  then  was  no  one  could 
possibly  predict  what  he  afterwards  became  as  the  defender  and 
personal  friend  of  the  helpless  and  despised.  There  was  always 
the  same  grace  and  dignity  of  personal  bearing,  the  same  remarka 
ble  power  of  eloquence,  whether  in  extempore  debate  or  studied 
declamation.  It  was  a  great  treat  to  hear  him  declaim  as  a  college 
exercise.  He  was  always  studying  remarkable  passages,  as  an 
exercise  in  composition,  and  to  secure  the  most  expressive  forms  of 
language,  as  well  as  an  exercise  in  elocution,  to  give  to  language  its 
greatest  possible  effect.  In  this  he  did  not  accept  the  aid  of 
teachers.  His  method  was  his  own. 


16 

Before  entering  college  he  had  been  the  subject  of  a  religious 
revival.  Previous  to  that  he  used  to  give  way  to  violent  outbursts 
of  temper,  and  his  schoolmates  would  sometimes  amuse  themselves 
by  deliberately  working  him  up  into  a  passion.  But  after  his  con 
version  they  could  never  succeed  in  getting  him  out  of  temper. 

"  His  classmates  would  have  selected  him  as  one  born  to  be  a 
power  among  men.  No  other  student  in  those  days  would  com 
pare  with  him  in  that  respect.  He  had  already  been  distinguished 
for  his  unsullied  purity  of  character.  But  it  was  not  easy  to  un 
derstand  how  this  aristocratic  leader  of  a  privileged  class  could 
cast  in  his  lot  with  the  most  despised  of  his  race.  The  simple  and 
true  explanation  is  that  a  new  thought  had  come  in  as  the  central 
motive  of  his  life.  His  attention  was  drawn  to  the  great  national 
curse  and  crime  of  his  day,  and  he  gave  himself  heart  and  soul  to 
the  cause. 

"  It  is  not  my  purpose  to  justify  every  word  or  act  of  his  ;  but 
this  I  would  say,  that,  having  known  him  in  the  pride  of  youthful 
ambition  and  the  opening  consciousness  of  great  powers,  and 
having  followed  him  through  fifty  years  of  great  events  in  which  he 
took  a  distinguished  part,  I  cannot  doubt  that  'in  his  heart  of 
heart '  he  was  profoundly  in  earnest,  and  that  the  deepest  sympa 
thies  of  his  nature  were  on  the  side  of  those  whom  the  world 
despised.  He  made  mistakes.  In  the  fierceness  of  the  fight  he 
sometimes  did  injustice  to  those  who  could  not  join  his  standard. 
But  his  exaggerations  were  those  of  one  mainly  intent  on  the 
weapons  that  could  be  used  most  effectively  in  a  righteous  cause. 
Where  he  erred  the  error  would  be  found  associated  with  his  intense 
interest  in  those  whom  he  regarded  as  peculiarly  his  clients.  He 
was  so  entirely  taken  up  with  the  sense  of  their  sufferings  and 
wrongs  that  he  could  act  only  as  their  advocate  irrespective  of  what 
might  be  due  to  those  who  seemed  to  stand  in  his  way." 


17 

At  twenty-two  he  was  through  his  law  studies.  At  twenty-three 
Phillips  was  admitted  to  practice  at  the  bar,  and  opened  his  office 
in  Boston,  where  we  are  told  that  for  three  years  he  waited  in  vain 
for  clients.  Mr.  Curtis,  in  his  Boston  oration,  speaks  of  his  sitting 
in  his  office  and  jesting  about  the  clients  that  did  not  come,  and 
also  of  his  sitting  there  a  year  later  still  expectant  of  clients. 

Mr.  Austin,  in  his  life  of  Wendell  Phillips,  minute  in  its  personal 
details,  gives  no  intimation  that  he  ever  made  a  speech  at  the  bar 
or  had  a  client.  These  facts  would  seem  to  set  the  question  at 
rest. 

But  the  sketch  of  Phillips's  life  in  the  last  edition  of  his  speeches 
speaks  thus  of  his  professional  business  :  "  A  large  and  increasing 
practice  so  occupied  his  time  that  he  forgot  all  else.  In  the  trial 
of  cases  at  the  bar  he  was  training  his  eloquence,  and  before  juries 
he  was  modulating  that  voice  so  soon  to  thrill  humanity." 

This  conflict  in  the  testimony  hitherto  available  is  point-blank ; 
and  here  I  rest  the  case,  saying  only  that  the  preceding  extract 
seems  in  the  light  of  all  the  counter  testimony  of  half  a  century 
very  like  the  play  of  imagination  irrespective  of  facts,  rather  than 
an  authentic  sketch  of  things  known. 

Since  writing  the  foregoing  I  have  received  from  my  young  kins 
man,  Mr.  A.  H.  Grimke,  explicit  testimony  upon  this  point  from 
Mr.  Phillips  himself.  He  has  kindly  given  me  the  following  details  : 
"It  was  at  a  suffrage  festival  in  Horticultural  Hall  in  1878  that 
Wendell  Phillips  told  me  the  story  of  a  case  which  he  conducted 
when  an  attorney  at  the  Boston  bar.  I  cannot  recall  the  character 
of  the  case,  nor  the  incidents  as  he  related  them.  All  I  remember, 
and  this  is  vivid,  is  that  the  young  lawyer  had  shown  unusual  skill 
in  handling  his  client's  interests,  and  that  the  recollection  of  the 
event  was  a  source  of  undisguised  satisfaction." 

Long  after  the  date  of  Mr.  Grimke"'s  letter,  explicit  information 


18 

came  to  me,  giving  in  detail  Mr.  Phillips's  own  testimony  about  his 
legal  practice,  with  the  antecedents  and  corroboratives  incident 
thereto.  These  were  sent  in  a  letter  written  by  a  lady  whose  anti- 
slavery  enthusiasm  at  five  years  old  so  charmed  Mr.  Phillips  that  he 
said  to  her,  "You  are  my  blessed  child;"  and  ever  after  the  same 
token  of  affection  followed  her  as  she  grew  to  womanhood  through 
years  of  intimacy  at  his  home,  till  "  my  blessed  child  "  was  garnered 
among  his  household  words.  No  marvel  that,  when  he  felt  life's 
close  drawing  near,  he  gave  her,  with  other  souvenirs,  his  mother's 
Bible,  and  that  his  last  words  to  her  in  his  last  hours  were,  "  You 
are  a  blessed  child,  remember  always  that  I  said  it." 

No  other  except  his  own  wife  has  received  from  Mr.  Phillips 
such  minute  details  of  his  life-career.  I  subjoin  the  following 
extracts  from  her  letter  : 

"  Since  Mr.  Phillips's  death,  statements  have  been  made  in  print, 
that  he  said  he  had  no  success  as  a  lawyer.  These  statements, 
like  many  others  concerning  Mr.  Phillips,  are  mistakes.  I  remem_ 
ber,  some  two  years  before  his  death,  calling  his  attention  to  an 
article  in  one  of  our  magazines,  written  by  a  person  who  assumed 
to  give  the  particulars  of  Mr.  Phillips's  life  in  the  Essex-street 
house  during  the  forty  years  he  had  lived  in  it.  When  I  asked  him 
what  he  thought  of  the  article,  he  said,  '  It  is  a  well-written  article, 
an  exceedingly  well- written  article,  when  you  consider  how  little  the 
man  knows  about  what  he  is  writing.  He  says  that  the  two  most 
distinguished  persons  ever  under  my  roof  were  Daniel  Webster  and 
Edward  Everett.  Now  neither  of  these  gentlemen  ever  visited  me 
and  I  had  no  acquaintance  with  them  ;  and  if  my  opinion  is  worth 
anything,  the  two  persons  most  famous  who  ever  visited  me  were 
John  Brown  and  William  Lloyd  Garrison,  and  the  writer  does  not 
seem  to  know  that  either  of  these  has  lived.' " 

"  Every  one  who  was  intimate  with  Mr.  Phillips,  knows,  that  when 


19 

he  was  graduated  from  Harvard  College  he  had  but  one  especial 
end  in  view,  and  that  was  the  study  of  law.  During  the  last  fifteen 
years  of  his  life  he  frequently  spoke  to  me  of  those  early  days,  and 
all  he  said  is  still  very  fresh  in  my  memory.  After  leaving  college 
he  never  contemplated  being  anything  but  a  success  in  his  chosen 
profession.  He  never  thought  of  giving  up  his  practice  until  his 
clients  left  him,  after  his  Fanueil  Hall  speech  ;  and  then,  but  not 
till  then,  he  gave  up  his  office  on  Court  street,  and  gave  himself, 
heart  and  soul,  to  the  cause  of  abolition. 

"  Wendell  Phillips  was  the  favorite  child  of  his  mother.  By  his 
father's  early  death  she  had  the  controlling  influence  over  his  edu 
cation  and  life-purposes.  She  was  a  woman  of  no  mean  gifts,  had 
great  energy  and  great  strength  of  character.  She  early  saw  the 
great  possibilities  that  lay  before  her  gifted  son,  and  sacrificed  much 
that  he  might  have  every  facility  for  furthering  his  professional 
success.  Wendell  entered  fully  into  the  spirit  of  his  mother  in  his 
resolve,  as  his  diary  kept  at  that  time  will  show,  to  win  eminence  as 
a  lawyer.  He  was  warranted  in  expecting  much,  for  Harvard  Col 
lege  had  given  him  all  her  honors.  He  often  spoke  to  me  of  his 
practice  and  the  nature  of  it.  'Very  much/  he  said,  'was  office 
work,  drawing  up  legal  papers,  wills,  &c.'  He  would  say  sometimes 
with  a  smile,  he  did  better  then  as  a  young  lawyer  than  young  men 
do  to-day  upon  entering  the  profession.  '  Those  two  years  I  paid 
all  my  expenses,  and  few  do  it  now.'  It  was  only  within  a  year  of 
his  death  that  he  gave  me  the  sign  that  had  hung  over  his  office 
window,  and  which  he  had  kept  all  these  years,  saying,  '  I  think 
you  will  see  that  it  is  never  destroyed.' 

"  Mr.  Sumner,  a  short  time  before  his  death,  speaking  to  me  of 
Mr.  Phillips,  said,  '  When  Mr.  Phillips  became  an  abolitionist  he 
withdrew  from  the  roll  of  Massachusetts  lawyers  the  name  of  one 
who  would  have  been  amongst  her  greatest.'  He  told  me  also 


20 

that,  as  young  men,  law-students  together,  Phillips  and  he  fre 
quently  discussed  the  horrors  of  slavery,  and  how  this  country 
could  be  freed  from  the  curse.  '  Little,'  said  Mr.  Sumner,  '  did  I 
then  dream  what  an  active  part  we  were  both  to  take  on  this  great 
question.'  " 

Phillips's  abolition  opinions  date  back  to  1831.  These  opinions 
were  kindled  into  a  burning  conviction  when  in  1835  ne  saw  tnat 
pro-slavery  mob  dragging  and  driving  Mr.  Garrison  bare-headed 
and  half-nude  through  the  streets  of  Boston.  To  an  intimate 
friend  he  said,  "  I  never  could  have  been  anything  but  an  aboli 
tionist  after  witnessing  that  spectacle." 

That  the  anti-slavery  leaven  previously  kneaded  into  Phillips's 
conscience  was  already  in  ferment  is  shown  thus  in  Mr.  Austin's 
life  of  Phillips  :  "  When  he  put  his  name  to  the  oath  to  protect  the 
United  States  Constitution  that  threw  a  partial  protection  round  the 
master  of  a  slave,  he  writhed  in  shame  at  his  weakness." 

This  was  in  1834,  a  year  before  those  barbarians  in  broadcloth 
gibbeted  themselves  in  infamy  along  with  the  municipal  authorities 
of  Boston  on  the  twenty-first  of  October,  1835.  From  that  hour 
Phillips's  relation  to  the  little  band  of  hunted  abolitionists  was  no 
longer  that  of  mere  opinion,  but  one  of  intense  conviction. 
Thenceforth  mind,  heart,  soul  and  tongue  lived  out  the  faith  which 
had  been  till  then  hardly  more  than  a  speculative  creed. 

His  first  anti-slavery  speech  was  before  the  Young  Men's  Anti- 
Slavery  Society  in  Lynn,  May,  1837.  That  speech  so  took  the 
Society  by  storm  that  they  forthwith  engaged  him  for  their  Fourth 
of  July  orator,  two  months  afterward.  Those  who  heard  that 
speech  insist  that  the  best  speeches  of  his  ripened  years  hardly 
surpassed  it. 

Five  months  later,  December  8th,  1837,  came  that  memorable 
scene  in  Fanueil  Hall.  There  in  the  old  Cradle  of  Liberty,  a  great 


21 

birth  was  born  for  freedom's  trial-hour.  There  the  frenzy  of  a 
pro-slavery  mob  was,  for  the  first  time,  confronted,  and  with  a  sub 
lime  audacity  defied  and  whelmed  in  defeat ;  an  assault  as  trium 
phant  in  its  issue  as  it  was  daring  and  resistless  in  its  victorious 
grapple.  That  victory  pioneered  to  the  American  platform  a  power 
unknown  to  it  before,  and  thenceforth  to  tread  it  alone,  monarch 
of  the  realm. 

The  immediate  occasion  of  that  scene  which  immortalized  anew 
the  old  Cradle  of  Liberty,  December  8th,  1837,  was  the  series  of 
tragedies  enacted  by  pro-slavery  mobs  in  St.  Louis,  Mo.,  and  Alton, 
111.,  destroying  successively  two  printing-offices,  four  presses  and 
sets  of  type,  and  murdering  the  editor  of  the  St.  Louis  "  Observer," 
who,  despite  threats  and  curses,  branded  slavery  as  sin.  For  this 
mobs  hurled  to  destruction  offices,  presses,  types  and  editor 
Pierced  with  five  balls  he  lay  in  his  blood,  his  murderers  scoffing 
over  him.  While  these  atrocities  were  the  special  occasion  of  that 
Fanueil-Hall  meeting,  its  logical  antecedents,  grown  then  to  a  mul 
titude,  compelled  those  who  called  it  to  instant  action.  Public 
sentiment  had  long  threatened  vengeance  against  all  anti-slavery 
speaking  and  writing.  These  threats  were  soon  flying  missiles  and 
blows.  Abolitionists  were  virtually  outlawed. 

This  public  sentiment,  begotten  by  the  slave-power,  was  endorsed 
by  all  the  free  states.  It  held  subject  Congress  and  the  Govern 
ment,  dominated  all  political  parties  and  religious  denominations, 
all  literature,  science  and  art,  all  general  pursuits,  industries  and 
interests.  This  subjection  was,  barring  individual  exceptions,  uni 
versal,  all  were  overmastered.  In  the  craven  spirit  of  slaves 
they  crouched  at  the  feet  of  their  masters.  This  fact  stands  indel 
ible  on  our  annals.  Those  stains,  grimed  into  the  escutcheons  of 
the  states  called  free,  are  burning  their  way  down  the  generations 
compelling  our  posterity  to  wear  the  brand  of  ancestral  infamy 


Do  any  demur  and  ask  what  that  infamy  was  ?  Answer  :  Civiliza 
tion  presupposes  a  government  of  law.  If  law  is  abolished,  society 
sinks  into  barbarism.  Sunk  thus  was  this  nation  then  in  its  rela 
tions  to  abolitionists.  Mobs  had  been  for  years  everywhere  in  out 
burst  against  them.  They  were  the  victims  of  an  indiscriminate 
ostracism,  everywhere  they  were  doomed  because  they  hated 
slavery  and  lived  out  that  hate.  Their  property,  liberties  and  lives 
lay  at  the  mercy  of  mobs.  In  thousands  of  cases  they  were  sub 
jected  to  personal  assaults,  beatings  and  buffetings,  with  nameless 
indignities.  They  were  stoned,  clubbed,  knocked  down  and  pelted 
with  missiles,  often  with  eggs,  and,  when  they  could  get  them, 
spoiled  ones.  They  were  smeared  with  filth,  stripped  of  clothing, 
tarred,  feathered,  ridden  upon  rails,  their  houses  sacked,  bonfires 
made  in  the  streets  of  their  furniture,  garments  and  bedding,  their 
vehicles  and  harnesses  were  cut  and  broken,  and  their  domestic 
animals  harried,  dashed  with  hot  water,  cropped,  crippled  and 
killed.  Among  these  outrages,  besides  assaults  and  breaches  of 
'the  peace,  there  were  sometimes  burglaries,  robberies,  maimings 
and  arsons ;  abolitionists  were  driven  from  their  homes  into  the 
fields  and  woods,  and  their  houses  burned.  They  were  dragged 
and  thrust  from  the  halls  in  which  they  held  their  meetings.  They 
were  often  shot  at,  and  sometimes  wounded.  In  one  mob  a 
number  were  thus  wounded  and  one  killed.  Vitriol  was  thrown 
upon  them.  Cayenne  pepper,  assafoetida  and  other  substances 
intolerable  to  eyes  and  olfactories  were  used  to  disperse  their 
meetings. 

For  a  quarter  of  a  century  our  civilization  was  thus  sunk  to  bar 
barism.  The  law,  which  to  others  was  protection,  to  abolitionists 
was  sheerest  mockery.  Yea,  more,  it  singled  them  out  as  its 
victims.  Professing  to  protect,  it  gave  them  up  to  ravage  and 
beckoned  the  spoilers  to  their  prey.  Of  the  tens  of  thousands 


23 

who  perpetrated  such  atrocities  not  one  suffered  the  least   lega 
penalty  for  those  astounding  violations  of  law  ! 

This  is  that  ancestral  infamy  of  which  our  ill-fated  posterity 
must  forever  wear  the  brand.  Of  the  multiform  illustrations  of  our 
civilization  sunk  thus  to  savagism,  I  select  the  monster  crime  named 
in  the  summons  to  the  Fanueil-Hall  meeting.  Its  murdered  vic 
tim  was  the  Rev.  Elijah  P.  Lovejoy,  a  man  of  noblest  mould. 
Born  at  Albion,  Maine,  then  Massachusetts,  he  was  graduated  at 
Waterville  College  with  its  highest  honors.  Settling  in  St.  Louis,  he 
first  edited  a  political  paper,  and  afterward  became  a  preacher,  and 
in  1833  was  selected  by  the  Presbyterians  to  edit  their  paper,  the 
St.  Louis  "  Observer."  In  the  fall  of  '36  a  mob  tore  down  its 
printing-office  and  hurled  its  press  and  types  into  the  Mississippi. 
Then  the  paper  was  removed  to  Alton,  111.,  where  during  that  year 
Mr.  Lovejoy  had  three  presses  successively  broken  up  and  their 
fragments  thrown  into  the  river.  When  the  mob  rushed  to  destroy 
the  last  press,  they  were  summoned  by  horn-blowing  throughout  the 
city  announcing  its  arrival.  They  began  by  smashing  the  windows 
of  the  storehouse  which  held  the  press,  then  set  it  on  fire,  shot 
down  the  editor,  and  fired  upon  the  abolitionists  as  they  ran  from  the 
burning  building.  Mr.  Lovejoy  had  published  articles  against 
slavery,  avowing  himself  no  immediate  abolitionist,  but  a  gradual 
emancipationist  and  colonizationist.  These  articles  stirred  the  rage 
of  slaveholders.  Threats  came  fast.  "  Lynch  him  !  "  "  Tear  down 
his  office  !  "  "  Pitch  his  press  into  the  river  !"  "Drive  him  out 
of  the  city  !  "  are  specimens  of  the  street-cries.  Public  meetings 
denounced  him  and  passed  inflammatory  resolutions  threatening 
vengeance.  Upon  this  Mr.  Lovejoy  published  an  appeal  to  his 
fellow-citizens.  The  following  extract  reveals  the  man  :  "  I  cannot 
surrender  my  convictions,  and  so  long  as  life  lasts  I  declare  my  de 
termination  to  maintain  this  ground.  I  am  ready  to  suffer  and  to 


24 

die  for  these  principles.  My  blood  shall  flow  freely  as  water  rather 
than  surrender  my  right  to  plead  the  cause  of  truth  in  the  face  of 
all  its  opposers.  With  God  I  cheerfully  rest  my  cause.  I  can  die  at 
my  post,  but  I  cannot  desert  it." 

These  pro-slavery  mobs  were  all  fresh  in  the  thoughts  and  fore 
bodings  of  those  who  summoned  that  Fanueil-Hall  meeting.  Its 
special  object  was  to  express  the  horror  felt  at  those  atrocities  in  St 
Louis  and  Alton,  and  to  brand  with  infamy  the  perpetrators  and  the 
legal  authorities,  false  to  their  trusts,  when  law  and  justice  were 
successfully  trampled  and  defied. 

Though  those  were  the  special  horrors  named  in  the  call,  yet  a 
deeper  horror  shadowed  those  who  signed  that  petition.  The 
slave-power  had  long  dominated  the  public  sentiment  of  the  free 
states.  Finding  at  length  the  abolitionists  denouncing  slavery  and 
organizing  against  it,  they  had  come  down  upon  them  in  wrath, 
stirring  up  anarchy  and  striking  down  law  by  spurring  on  the  law 
less  to  usurp  it,  nullify  it,  and  foist  into  its  place  the  rage  of  the 
hour.  The  summoners  of  that  meeting  knew  that  pro-slavery 
mobs,  multiplying  for  years,  were  then  all  abroad  hunting  down 
their  victims,  trampling  every  safeguard  of  property,  liberty  and 
life.  In  this  universal  ravin  and  ravage,  constitutions,  bills  oi 
rights,  civil  and  penal  codes,  grand  and  petit  juries,  free  speech, 
and  freedom  of  the  press  were  all  trodden  as  mire  by  these 
dehumanized  beasts  of  prey. 

Never  in  the  nation's  straits  had  there  come  a  crisis  so  momen 
tous,  never  had  portents,  foreboding  doom,  so  thickened  and  thun 
dered  over  the  nation  as  then. 

The  foundations  were  shaken ;  Government  had  a  name  to  live, 
but  only  in  words  that  scoffed  at  its  shadow.  Anarchy  rampant 
drove  baffled  liberty  and  law  before  it.  The  roar  of  riot  and  the 
tramp  of  mobs  hurtled  in  all  the  air.  In  its  mad  onset  upon 


25 

personal  rights  Wendell  Phillips  beheld  slavery's  deadly  grapple 
with  liberty  and  law,  and  high  above  the  clangor  of  battle  heard 
freedom's  tocsin  ring  out  its  wild  alarum.  Instant  at  the  rallying 
summons  he  appears  upon  the  scene.  Long  before  this  he  had 
learned  the  folly  of  gradualism,  the  inadequacy  and  falseness  of  the 
colonization  scheme,  and  the  duty  and  safety  of  immediate  aboli 
tion.  But  no  mere  opinions  can  fathom  the  soul's  depths.  They 
may  lie  dormant  a  lifetime.  Half  dormant  Phillips's  anti-slavery 
opinions  were  till  he  saw  slave-holding  horrors  ablaze  in  the  frenzy 
of  pro-slavery  mobs.  Then  his  latent  anti-slavery  beliefs  new-born 
became  living  inspirations.  Then  only  could  he  "  remember  those 
in  bonds  as  bound  with  them."  Such  thoughts  and  purposes  set 
astir  in  brain,  heart  and  will  soon  grew  into  convictions  that  flamed 
in  speech  and  act.  True  they  had  smouldered  long,  but  when  they 
burst  ablaze  the  flame  was  quenchless  evermore. 

Before  recalling  that  flame-burst  of  Phillips's  in  Fanueil  Hall,  let 
us  trace  it  from  its  first  kindling  until  it  set  all  his  powers  on  fire. 
Great  moral  reforms  are  all  born  of  soul-travail.  Their  growth  is 
slow  and  long,  when  the  roots  of  monster  crime  are  deep-shot  and 
strike  far  out  around.  Such  reforms  compel  desperate  struggles  to 
wrench  out  false  principles  embedded  in  public  sentiment  till  pet 
rified  into  chronic  prejudices,  bigotries,  superstitions,  greeds, 
grudges,  hates,  moral  gangrenes  and  passions,  inherited  and  im 
memorial,  the  fossils  of  ages. 

To  do  this,  all  possibilities  of  mind,  soul  and  spirit  must  be 
wrought  in  utmost  outlay.  To  launch  a  vast  radical  reform  with 
such  momentum  as  shall  crown  it  victor  is  the  sublimest  of  human 
achievements.  What  ponderings,  wrestlings  and  spirit-throes  in 
those  who  set  it  in  motion  !  What  travelings,  explorings,  sittings, 
testings,  analyzings  !  What  pains  in  gathering  the  underlying  facts 
with  all  they  involve  !  Then  follows  that  long  brooding  over 


26 

details,  casting  and  recastm^  till  plans  ripened  and  souls  fired, 
with  what  might  and  main  the  reform  is  pioneered  into  being  !  The 
starting  point  and  power  of  every  great  reform  must  be  the 
reformer's  self.  He  first  must  set  himself  apart  its  sacred  devotee, 
baptised  into  its  spirit,  consecrated  to  its  service,  feeling  its  pro 
found  necessity,  its  constraining  motives,  impelling  causes,  and  all 
reasons  why. 

Then  his  kindled  soul  will  enkindle  others,  and  never  till  then. 
Such  sublime  intensities  fired  William  Lloyd  Garrison  when  he 
kneeled,  his  open  Bible  before  him,  and  consecrated  his  life  to  the 
abolition  of  slavery.  This  consecration  was  absolute  and  utter. 
Thenceforth  that  life  was  never  his  own.  Well  might  this  greatest 
reform  of  these  later  ages  hail  him  alone,  as  it  does  reverently 
to-day,  as  its  prime  originator.  Garrison's  magnetic  contact  and 
kindling  example  inspired  in  Wendell  Phillips  that  same  soul- 
yearning,  rapt  devotion,  heroic  daring,  unconquerable  will  and  self- 
consecration,  which  first  burst  into  flames  at  Fanueil  Hall,  gilding 
anew  the  revolutionary  Cradle  of  Liberty  with  its  old-time  glory. 
"To  that  man,"  Phillips  used  to  say,  "  I  owe  all  my  anti-slavery  inspi 
ration."  Seven  years  after  the  starting  of  the  "Liberator,"  Phillips's 
abolition  reached  its  furnace  heat.  This  was  after  he  had  seen 
Garrison  dragged  and  driven  through  the  streets  of  Boston  by  that 
vandal  mob  in  broadcloth,  and  two  years  before  he  sprang  into  that 
thickest  fight  in  Fanueil  Hall,  December  8th,  1837,  when  he  faced 
the  attorney-general  and  his  mob,  rolled  back  on  them  their  tide  of 
battle  and  whelmed  them  under  it,  as  the  Red  Sea  buried  their 
slave-holding  kindred,  kith  and  kin.  From  October,  1835,  to 
December,  1837,  Phillips  was  exploring  the  slavery  question 
throughout :  slavery's  havoc  upon  slaves,  its  reaction  upon  slave 
holders,  the  domination  of  the  slave-power  over  the  free  states, 
holding  them  all  in  its  clutch,  subject,  abject  and  servile.  These 


27 

explorings  and  ponderings  ripened  Phillips  apace  for  the  work 
awaiting  him.  As  he  mused  the  fire  burned ;  as  he  bided  his  time 
it  was  gathering  that  momentum  which  soon  impelled  it  from  con 
quering  to  conquer.  That  power  which  bore  him  serene  through  all 
perils  is  no  mystery.  He  had  studied  slavery,  knew  its  nature,  ten 
dencies,  effects  ;  knew  that  its  breath  was  poison  and  its  touch 
palsy.  The  spectacle  of  the  Nation  strewn  with  its  havoc  touched 
his  inmost  and  summoned  out  his  utmost.  A  supernal  passion 
fired  him ;  a  divine  magnetism  lifted  him  exultant  above  all  peril, 
loss  and  sacrifice,  till  he  counted  suffering  and  desperate  struggle 
all  joy,  a  glad  free-will  offering,  free  as  air,  to  the  cause  of  human 
ity,  freedom,  and  the  nation's  salvation. 

Just  a  hundred  years  to  a  month,  almost  to  a  day,  before  Phil- 
lips's  Fanueil  Hall  speech,  John  Wesley,  after  living  two  years  in 
the  midst  of  slavery  in  Georgia,  shook  the  dust  from  his  feet 
against  it,  and  sailed  from  Savannah  back  to  England,  crying  out 
as  he  left,  "Slavery  is  the  sum  of  all  villainies."  The  truest, 
tersest,  strongest  half-dozen  words  ever  tabled  against  it.  Glorious 
old  John  Wesley  had  a  heart  of  flesh,  that  voiced  those  astounding 
words,  "  sum  of  all  villainies."  Well  he  knew  that  language  had 
no  word  that  could  fitly  name  the  monster.  So  in  despair  of  nam 
ing  it  he  could  only  define  it.  As  he  gazed  at  it  no  marvel  that  his 
eyes  filled,  his  sight  grew  dim,  his  brain  grew  dizzy.  He  listened 
till  shrieks  stunned  him.  He  pondered  the  ghastly  horror  till  the 
breath  he  drew  steamed  rank  with  the  scent  of  blood.  That  same 
"  sum  of  all  villainies  "  Wendell  Phillips  had  now  gazed  at,  listened 
to  and  pored  over  till  he  could  gaze  and  pore  no  longer.  Horrors 
shuddered  through  his  musings,  haunted  his  night-watches  and 
peopled  his  dreams.  Then  and  thus  he  mastered  slavery,  traced 
its  track  as  it  trailed  its  pestilent  slime  over  all  the  free  states,  sting 
ing  in  its  poison  through  their  vital  circulation.  Silent,  secret. 


28 

wide-working,  that  deadly  leaven  was  everywhere  in  hot  ferment, 
blinding,  blunting,  besotting,  palsying  the  public  mind  till  it  knew 
not  itself,  only  the  frenzies  of  the  demons  that  possessed  it.  These 
demons  gnashed  and  howled  under  the  Ithurial  touch  of  Garrison 
like  their  prototypes  of  old  under  the  exorcism  of  Jesus.  Phillips 
knew  that  these  onslaughts  upon  liberty  and  law,  only  brutal  at 
first,  had  grown  murderous  ;  that  the  great  body  of  the  free  North, 
East  and  West  were  in  their  relations  to  the  abolitionists  virtually 
demoniac.  None  but  those  who  saw  and  heard  or  were  the  vic 
tims  of  those  atrocities  can  conceive  of  the  blind  furor  that 
seized  all  classes,  dementalizing  and  dehumanizing.  An  insane 
contagion  swept  through  the  land  like  the  sirocco  of  the  desert,  and 
struck  down  as  if  plague-smitten  whomever  it  touched.  In  every 
free  state,  men  not  a  few,  and  women  many,  uprose  unterrified  and 
launched  their  execrations  against  the  cursed  thing,  denouncing  in 
the  name  of  law,  civilization  and  religion  those  outlaws  who  had 
trampled  all  law  and  shouted  all-hail  to  mobs  and  murderers.  If 
it  ever  befitted  any  people  in  last  extremity  to  cry  out,  "  Compan 
ions  in  peril,  come  to  the  rescue,  lest  the  things  that  belong  to  our 
peace  be  hidden  forever  from  our  eyes,"  they  surely  were  that 
people ;  then  was  the  time  and  there  in  the  old  Cradle  of  Liberty 
was  of  all  places  the  place  to  debate  that  question,  vital  to  all. 
For  sixty  years  that  Cradle  which  rocked  the  Revolution  in  its 
giant  infancy  had  stood  still  awaiting  another  epoch  to  fill  it  and 
set  in  motion. 

That  epoch  had  come.  The  old  Cradle  was  rocking  again  with 
another  birth  to  Liberty.  William  Ellery  Channing,  who  wrote 
the  petition  to  the  mayor  and  aldermen  of  Boston,  and  the  one 
hundred  who  signed  it,  were  the  men  for  the  hour  and  its  work. 
The  hour  had  struck ;  so  had  the  mayor  and  aldermen,  but  the 
note  they  struck  was  not  liberty's  key-note,  but  slavery's  and  mob 


29 

law's.  Then,  as  a  peace-offering  to  slave-holders,  they  denied  the 
prayer  of  the  one  hundred  petitioners,  saying  that,  if  granted,  it 
might  be  thought  the  voice  of  the  city.  Ignoble,  coward  words  ! 
vVell  did  the  sworn  custodians  of  Boston's  fair  fame  brand  thus 
their  infamy  upon  their  own  foreheads.  So  they  barred  up  the 
door  of  Fanueil  Hall  against  free  speech,  liberty  and  law,  and  em 
blazoned  thereon  the  symbols  of  the  city's  new  heraldry,  slavery's 
armorial  ensigns,  coffle-chains,  fetters,  whips,  gags  and  branding- 
irons.  Immediately  Dr.  Channing  issued  the  following  appeal  to 
the  citizens  of  Boston  : 

"  Has  it  come  to  this  ?  Has  Boston  fallen  so  low  ?  May  not  its 
citizens  be  trusted  to  come  together  to  express  the  great  principles 
of  liberty  for  which  their  fathers  died?  Are  our  fellow-citizens  to 
be  murdered  in  the  act  of  defending  their  property  and  of  assum 
ing  the  right  of  free  discussion  ?  And  is  it  unsafe  in  this  metropo 
lis  to  express  abhorrence  of  the  deed  ?  If  such  be  our  degrada 
tion  we  ought  to  know  the  awful  truth,  and  those  among  us  who 
retain  a  portion  of  the  spirit  of  our  ancestors  should  set  themselves 
to  work  to  recover  their  degenerate  posterity." 

These  trenchant  words  cut  to  the  quick.  No  time  was  lost.  In 
a  trice  placards  in  capitals  flared  on  the  street  corners,  summoning 
citizens  to  the  Supreme  Court  room  to  discuss  the  reasons  of  the 
mayor  and  aldermen  for  denying  the  prayer  of  the  one  hundred 
citizens.  Prompt  at  the  hour  the  audience  came.  Discussion  had 
free  course,  the  decision  was  unanimous,  A  new  application  was 
decreed,  drawn  up  on  the  spot  and  signed  by  hundreds  more  and 
sent.  Of  a  sudden  new  light  broke  upon  the  optics  of  Boston's 
authorities  and  old  Fanueil  Hall,  rekindling  with  its  ancient  mem 
ories,  swung  wide  open  again  to  the  new-born  spirit  of  '76. 

But  the  story  of  that  meeting  cannot  be  fitly  told  without  first 
describing  those  scenes  that  Phillips  witnessed  two  years  before 


30 

when  he  saw  the  slave  power  strike  dead  Boston's  government  of 
law,  and  bend  under  its  yoke  the  necks  of  her  mayor  and  all  her 
city  authorities  and  hold  them  there  subject,  abject  and  servile  to 
its  bidding,  thus  ruling  out  the  reign  of  law  and  ruling  in  the  reign 
of  anarchy  and  outlawry,  brandishing  for  their  sceptres  the 
bludgeons  of  mobs. 

The  lessons  learned  by  Phillips  then  trained  him  for  his  achieve 
ment  upon  that  historic  arena  which  launched  his  abolition  career. 
That  education  for  his  life-work  calls  for  a  brief  notice  here. 

Two  years  before  that  meeting,  Wendell  Phillips,  from  the  glowing 
threshhold  of  his  young  manhood,  looked  down  upon  Boston  help 
less  in  the  clutches  of  a  mob  of  thousands,  its  mayor,  aldermen 
and  police  consenting  and  conniving,  while  law,  justice  and  civili 
zation  itself  lay  trodden  in  the  streets.  He  saw  William  Lloyd 
Garrison,  for  words  spoken  against  slavery,  pounced  upon  by  a  mob, 
driven  and  dragged  half  nude  through  the  streets  of  Boston,  while 
anarchy  defiant  shouted  over  its  barbarian  conquest.  Thus  Phil 
lips  sees  his  native  city  lock  round  her  wrists  the  slave-handcuffs 
and  its  gyves  round  her  ankles,  and  receive  its  iron  gag  within  her 
lips,  and  clasp  with  eager  hands  its  coffle-chains  as  she  thrusts  her 
bended  neck  beneath  its  yoke,  and  quick  at  the  word  take  her 
slaves'  place  in  the  come,  fast  chained,  and  as  it  moves  keep  step  as 
best  she  may  with  her  fettered  feet  to  the  crack  of  the  driver's 
whip. 

He  saw  that  this  self-sale  of  Boston  to  the  slave-power  in  its 
own  shambles  was  instant  death  to  a  government  of  law,  and  in 
stant  life  to  a  reign  of  terror,  the  chaos  of  anarchy  and  blind  rage. 
He  heard  its  hurtle  in  the  air,  its  yells  and  curses  in  the  streets,  and 
the  rush  of  its  myriad  mob  as  they  tramped  along  the  pave. 

He  saw  the  sign  "  Anti-slavery  Office  "  dashed  to  the  sidewalk 
and  stamped  into  splinters.  He  saw  the  Women's  Anti-slavery 


81 

Society  in  session,  the  president  opening  the  meeting  with  prayer. 
Of  a  sudden  Boston's  mayor  rushes  in  shouting,  "  Ladies,  go  home, 
go  home  S" 

President :  "  Why  should  we  go  home  ?" 

Mayor :  "  I  am  the  mayor.  I  cannot  now  explain.  Do  no 
stop,  ladies,  go  home.  Do  you  wish  to  see  a  scene  of  blood 
shed?  If  not,  go  home." 

Mrs.  Chapman  :  "  Mr.  Mayor,  your  personal  friends  are  the  in 
stigators  of  this  mob." 

Mayor :  "  I  know  no  personal  friends ;  I  am  only  an  official' 
You  must  go  home.  It  is  dangerous  to  remain." 

Mrs.  Chapman  :  "  If  this  is  the  last  bulwark  of  freedom,  we  may 
as  well  die  here  as  anywhere." 

The  mob  rushed  in  and  filled  the  room.  Failing  to  find  Mr. 
Garrison  they  burst  into  another,  find,  seize,  tie  a  rope  around  him 
and  let  him  down  through  a  window  to  the  mob  outside,  who  clutch 
their  prey,  tear  off  his  coat,  vest  and  hat,  and  drag  and  push  him 
through  the  streets.  "  Why  don't  the  mayor  call  out  the  troops  ?" 
shouted  Phillips.  "WThy  does  he  stand  there  arguing?  Why 
doesn't  he  call  for  the  guns?"  Then  recognizing  his  colonel  in  the 
crowd  looking  on,  he  shouts,  "  Colonel,  why  don't  you  call  out  our 
regiment !  Offer  our  services  to  the  mayor  to  rescue  this  man  and 
put  down  the  mob?"  The  colonel  shouted  back,  "Phillips,  can't 
you  see  that  our  regiment  are  already  there  in  the  mob  !"  The 
mayor,  the  aldermen,  the  hundreds  of  policemen,  where  are  they? 
All  there.  What  doing  ?  Nothing  but  looking  on.  "  Why  don't 
they  arrest  the  mob-leaders,"  shouts  Phillips,  "and  rescue  their 
victim  and  scatter  the  mob?"  "Mob  !  Mob  !"  shouted  indignant 
voices.  "  Look  at  them.  They  are  respectable  gentlemen  of 
property  and  standing."  Just  what  the  papers  said  of  the  mob  the 
next  morning. 


32 


But  let  us  give  the  mayor  of  Boston  his  due  lor  a  chivalrous  act 
of  patriotic  daring.  He  boldly  ordered  in  open  day  the  arrest  of 
a  man  as  a  disturber  of  the  peace  and  sent  him  to  jail  by  due  pro 
cess  of  law,  and  thus  he  plucked  up  by  the  locks  the  drowning 
honor  of  Boston.  Who  was  that  notorious  outlaw,  arrested  by  the 
mayor  and  sent  to  jail  for  disturbing  the  peace?  His  name  was 
William  Lloyd  Garrison.  The  mob  being  all  respectable  law- 
abiding  gentlemen  of  property  and  standing,  every  one  had,  ot 
course,  sacredly  kept  the  peace  ;  andas  Garrison  was  the  only  one 
who  had  broken  the  peace  and  thus  shown  himself  a  rampant  mob- 
ocrat  it  was  eminently  fit  that  he  alone  should  suffer  the  penalty 
and  be  sent  to  jail  by  due  process  of  law,  and  thus  the  oppressed 
city  breathe  free  again.  The  plague  was  stayed,  and  the  heroic 
mayor  was  immortalized.  Thus  the  majesty  of  law  was  magnified 
and  the  honor  of  Boston's  honorable  authorities  kept  free  from 
stain.  But  enough  !  Wendell  Phillips  had  his  lesson  now  and 

conned  it  well. 

He  traced  the  lineal  descent  of  that  Boston  mob  direct  from 
another  mob  two  hundred  years  before,  which  first  mobbed  down 
black  men  and  women  into  slaves,  and  then  their  posterity  as  fast  as 
born ;  and  with  it  thick  mingled  their  own  posterity  marked  by 
every  shade  from  black  to  dark,  from  dark  to  slightest  tinge,  and  so 
from  mother  to  child  he  traced  the  onslaughts  of  this  vandal  mob 
upon  all  human  rights,  until  free  speech  and  press,  pulpit,  platform 
and  pew,  Congress,  legislature,  the  army  and  navy,  the  bench  and 
bar,  colleges,  all  professions,  all  hotels,  public  conveyances  and 
places  of  amusement,  he  saw  these  all,  all  swept  under  the  iron  in 
terdict  and  duress  of  an  overmastering  public  sentiment  begotten 
by  the  slave-power  and  propagating  everywhere  its  kind.  A  public 
sentiment  of  threat,  gag  and  padlock,  the  scorpion's  sting  and  lash, 
the  serpent's  hiss  and  fang,  taunt,  jibe,  jeer  and  scoff,  scorn's  unmov- 


33 

ing  finger  pointing,  and  hate's  hot  glances  shot  from  flaming  eyes. 
Though  at  this  date  these  mob  atrocities  of  the  slave-power  had 
not  made  young  Phillips  their  victim,  yet  he  well  knew  their  name 
less  outrages  upon  abolitionists,  the  natural  outworkings  of  the 
principle  that  sinks  men  into  chattels  and  strikes  down  their  self- 
right  and  with  it  all  rights,  and  blots  out  the  eternal  distinction  be 
tween  a  man  and  a  thing. 

He  knew  that  the  system  of  slavery  is  itself  mob-law  rampant, 
one  class  of  persons  clutching  another  and  robbing  them  of  all 
they  have  and  of  themselves  to  boot ;  knew  that  such  a  social  state 
is  sheer  outlawry,  the  blind  riot  of  passion,  lust  and  will,  as  their 
gusts  come  and  go.  Consequently  when  the  city  authorities  sur 
rendered  their  power  to  a  mob  they  stripped  Boston  nude  before 
the  sun  and  plunged  her  from  civilization  into  barbarism. 

Phillips  traced  all  this  to  its  source,  the  all-grasping  greed  of  the 
slave-power,  sanctioned  by  statute  and  sanctified  by  the  churches, 
baptising  it  at  their  fonts,  installing  it  at  their  altars,  and  in  fraternal 
fellowship  giving  it  cordial  welcome  to  the  tables  of  their  com 
munion.  He  saw  it  not  only  holding  overmastered  the  public  sen 
timent  of  the  free  states,  but  bent  upon  crushing  out  all  freedom 
of  speech  and  print  and  the  last  pulse  of  life  in  the  spirit  of  liberty 
itself. 

Pro-slavery  mobs  were  ravaging  everywhere,  pro-slavery  public 
sentiment  palsying  everywhere  free  speech ;  hosts  of  facts  in  thick 
array  trooping  up  from  every  quarter  and  revealing  spectacles  in 
tensifying  the  crisis.  Phillips  was  now  armed,  equipped  and  girded, 
filled  full  and  fired  and  eager  for  the  summons  to  the  Fanueil-Hall 
meeting. 

The  day  of  the  meeting  came  and  with  it  the  audience.  Before 
entering  upon  its  events  current  misconceptions  call  for  correction. 
The  common  belief  is  that  Phillips  went  to  the  meeting  not  intend- 


34 

ing  to  speak.  Mr.  Austin,  in  his  life  of  Phillips,  says  he  had  come 
into  that  meeting  only  to  listen.  The  sketch  of  his  life  in  the  last 
edition  of  his  speeches  says,  "Wendell  Phillips,  who  had  not 
expected  to  take  part  in  the  meeting,  rose  in  reply."  Those  of 
Phillips's  most  intimate  anti-slavery  friends  who  still  survive, 
declare  that  he  went  intending  to  speak.  That  intent  he  carried 
out  in  the  argument  filling  seven  pages  in  the  volume  of  his 
speeches.  That  argument  was  printed  verbatim  from  notes  taken 
as  he  spoke.  Its  logic  he  had  thought  out,  'its  phraseology  was  the 
birth  of  the  moment.  He  spoke  wholly  without  notes. 

That  splendid  outburst  upon  the  Attorney- General  sprang  spon 
taneous  at  the  instant.  Further  the  accounts  represent  him  as 
speaking  from  the  platform  of  the  hall.  They  mistake.  Dr. 
Channing,  fearing  that  if  he  spoke  from  that  he  could  not  be  heard, 
had  a  lectern  placed  in  front  and  near  the  middle  of  the  hall,  from 
which  he  spoke.  When  Mr.  Phillips  arose  he  took  that  for  his 
station.  The  hour  for  the  meeting  came  ;  those  in  sympathy  with 
its  object  filled  the  first-floor:  earnest,  enkindled,  determined  and 
silent,  there  they  stood.  The  gallery  was  packed  with  a  crowd  of 
another  sort,  lawless,  turbulent,  fierce,  bent  on  riot,  and  lowering 
malign  upon  the  law-abiding  phalanx  below.  The  Honorable 
Jonathan  Phillips,  a  kinsman  of  young  Wendell,  presided. 

Brief  resolutions  drawn  by  Dr.  Channing  announced  the  crisis 
and  the  momentous  interests  at  stake,  and  summoned  all  to  rally  in 
defense  of  law,  imperilled  by  lawless  hordes.  Then  came  his 
speech,  in  thought  and  phrase  full  of  weight  and  light.  Then  fol 
lowed  Mr.  Hilliard's  incisive  address.  Then  in  the  front  gallery  up 
rose  a  bold-faced  man  and  launched  into  a  violent  harangue.  His 
whole  aspect  revealed  the  bully,  truculent,  insolent  and  defiant,  his 
face  a  sneer,  his  voice  a  taunt,  his  whole  air  threat  and  swagger, 
as  he  shouted,  "  Lovejoy  died  like  a  fool."  Then  he  compared  the 


35 

drunken  mob  that  shot  him  down  to  the  revolutionary  sires,  who 
spurned  overboard  that  hated  tea  taxed  by  British  usurpation. 
Thus  glorifying  a  mob  of  assassins  by  likening  their  atrocities  to 
the  patriotic  exploits  of  the  men  of  '76,  and  thus  dragging  them 
down  to  the  depths  of  infamy  along  with  bandits  and  brigands. 
But  not  content  with  the  infamy  which  his  speech  thus  far  had 
earned,  he  aspires  to  the  role  of  a  blackguard,  and  so  takes  for  his 
target  the  venerable  Dr.  Channing,  insulting  him  thus  :  "  A  clergy 
man  mingling  in  the  debates  of  a  popular  assembly  is  marvellously 
out  of  his  place."  Then  he  compliments  the  slave-holders  by 
using  their  pet  illustration  of  slaves  set  free,  and  likens  them  to 
wild  beasts  in  a  menagerie ;  Mr.  Lovejoy  as  their  keeper  letting 
loose  lions,  tigers  and  hyenas  upon  the  people. 

Who  was  this  railing  brawler,  villifying  the  revolutionary  dead  by 
herding  them  with  murderers  ?  The  Attorney-General  of  Massa 
chusetts,  the  highest  legal  officer  of  the  Commonwealth.  Was  this 
a  man  whom  the  grand  old  Bay  State  delighted  to  honor  ? 

She  had  sunk  thus  low.  Then  it  was  when  liberty,  law  and 
justice  put  on  sack-cloth,  cast  dust  upon  their  heads,  and  sat  down 
in  ashes  wailing  forlorn  together,  for  truth  had  fallen  in  the  streets, 
equity  could  not  enter,  justice  stood  afar  off,  and  judgment  was 
turned  away  backward. 

Profoundly  revolving  these  horrors,  Wendell  Phillips  had  come 
up  to  this  great  consult  in  the  old  Cradle  of  Liberty.  Musing  on 
the  drear  past,  brooding  over  the  heaving  present,  and  forecasting 
the  portentous  future,  he  could  give  less  heed  than  he  would  to 
the  wise  words  of  the  venerated  Channing.  But  when  the  brutal 
harangue  of  the  Attorney-General  smote  his  ear,  his  half-revery 
broke  with  a  crash  as  he  heard  Austin's  scornful  flout  of  Lovejoy, 
that  he  "  died  like  a  fool,"  his  impious  eulogy  of  his  murderers,  his 
sacrilegious  slander  of  the  revolutionary  dead.  Indignant  he 


36 

exclaimed,  "  This  must  be  denounced  on  the  spot."  "  Do  it  your 
self,"  said  a  friend  at  his  side.  As  soon  as  Austin's  last  brutal 
words  dropped,  Phillips  sprang  to  the  lectern.  Then  came  that 
outburst  of  eloquence,  in  tempest,  soul  of  fire,  flashing  its  lighten- 
ings  from  a  tongue  of  flame. 

"  Sir,  when  I  heard  principles  laid  down  that  place  the  murderers 
of  Alton  side  by  side  with  Otis  and  Hancock,  with  Quincy  and 
Adams,  I  thought  those  pictured  lips  would  have  broken  into  voice 
to  rebuke  that  recreant  American,  the  slanderer  of  the  dead.  Sir, 
for  the  sentiment  he  has  uttered  on  soil  consecrated  by  the  prayers 
of  Puritans  and  the  blood  of  patriots  the  earth  should  have 
yawned  and  swallowed  him  up  !"  Then  from  the  mob  in  the 
gallery  burst  howls  of  rage,  and  down  plunged  an  avalanche  of 
yells  and  curses.  Babel  clanged  jargon,  and  bedlam  broke  loose, 
drowning  all  speech.  At  last  these  mob-yells  came  clanging 
through  the  din,  "  Take  that  back,  take  that  back ;  make  him  take 
back  that  word  recreant.  He  shan't  go  on  till  he  has  taken  that 
back." 

At  length  mob-throats  grew  hoarse,  and  Phillips  began  :  "  I  will 
not  take  back  my  words.  Surely  the  Attorney- General  needs  not 
the  aid  of  your  hisses  against  one  so  young  as  I  am." 

When  Phillips's  volcanic  outburst  had  blown  the  Attorney-General 
out  of  sight  he  began  to  dissect  his  argument.  He  showed  that  it 
was  neither  law  nor  logic,  had  neither  premise  nor  conclusion,  was 
a  sheer  inflammatory  harangue  to  infuriate  the  mob  he  led. 

At  the  end  of  Phillips's  speech  where  was  that  burley  swell  of 
brag,  brass  and  bluster?  At  the  outset  sneering,  insolent,  defiant, 
he  had  burst  upon  the  meeting  with  the  swing  and  swagger  of  a 
bravado.  In  the  role  of  a  bully  he  had  blurted  insults  at  his  own 
pastor,  and  with  swinish  hoofs  had  trampled  the  ashes  of  the 
revolutionary  dead.  Now  at  the  meeting's  close  what  is  left  of  his 


37 

bloated  grandiloquence?  He  had  seen  his  speech  hanging  all 
slashed  into  tatters  by  Phillips's  scalpel,  and  flung  for  the  winds  to 
whistle  at;  had  heard  himself  arraigned  as  a  culprit,  denounced 
and  execrated,  he  had  felt  dashed  against  his  brazen  brow  and 
burning  into  it  the  brand  of  infamy  as  that  conquering  young  arm 
launched  the  bolt  that  smote  him  down.  That  bolt  was  symbolized 
in  the  stone  sped  to  Goliath's  forehead  by  the  hand  of  a  stripling 
three  thousand  years  before,  when  the  giant  of  Gath  dashed  to 
earth  lay  headless  in  the  bloody  dust.  Thus  was  the  Goliath  of 
the  Bay  State  bar  struck  down  by  another  stripling  who,  though  he 
never  had  a  brief,  had  yet  a  sling  and  stone,  an  unerring  aim,  and 
an  arm  that  drove  the  missile  home.  The  bolt  flew  true,  and  down 
headlong  went  the  perjured  official,  perfidious  to  highest  trusts, 
false  to  liberty,  and  patron  of  mobs  and  murderers,  and  grand  old 
Fanueil  Hall  rang  out  in  a  thousand  echoes  its  loud  amen  !  Those 
plaudits  were  to  the  victim  stern  prophets  of  doom.  In  them  he 
heard  the  tolling  of  his  knell.  He  had  sown  the  wind,  now  he 
reaps  the  whirlwind.  Where  was  he  now  who  had  brandished  aloft 
his  magniloquence  in  eulogy  of  mobs  and  murderers?  Where 
and  what  was  he  now? 

Nowhere  and  nothing.  Dazed,  stunned,  struck  dumb,  transfixed 
by  fork-lightning,  sic  exit  Austin.  Thus  may  all  foes  of  liberty  and 
law  be  made  to  foam  out  their  shame  in  face  of  the  noontide  sun. 

The  arraignment  which  the  Hebrew  prophet  tabled  against  his 
nation  as  she  weltered  in  the  pit  of  her  abominations  twenty-seven 
hundred  years  ago  was  true  to  the  letter  of  our  nation  when 
Phillips  first  woke  to  life  those  echoes  in  Fanueil  Hall  that  had 
slept  for  sixty  years.  These  are  those  words  of  dread  shouted  by 
the  Hebrew  prophet  in  the  ears  of  besotted  Israel : 

"A  horrible  thing  is  committed  in  the  land.  The  prophets 
prophesy  falsely,  and  the  priests  bear  rule  by  their  means,  and  the 


people  love  to  have  it  so  ;  but  what  will  ye  do  in  the  £nd  thereof?" 
thundered  the  old  prophet  of  God.  Well  may  that  same  dread 
question  pierce  the  deaf  ears  of  our  generation  to-day.  Yea, 
what  will  ye  do  in  the  end  thereof?  That  is  the  question.  What 
will  ye  do  in  the  end  thereof?  Does  no  answer  come  ?  Hark  ! 
a  burial  ground  that  no  eye  can  span  is  astir  and  tossing.  Myriad 
graves  break  up  their  sods,  and  from  out  the  heaving  ground  this 
answer  comes :  "  Here  moulder  the  bones  of  a  million  men,  but 
not  yet,  no,  not  yet  cometh  the  end  thereof.'* 


LETTERS. 

JAMAICA  PLAIN,  Nov.  21, 1885. 
MY  DEAR  MRS.  CROSBY. 

I  am  sorry  not  to  be  able  to  be  present  and  to  listen  to  Mr.  Theodore  D. 
Weld's  paper  on  the  29th.  Whatever  he  may  say  will  be  sure  to  be  interest 
ing  and  instructive.  Long  ago,  when  I  lived  in  Kentucky,  his  book  on  the 
atrocities  of  slavery  made  an  impression  on  me  which  I  never  forgot.  Slav 
ery,  as  it  existed  around  me  there,  was  of  a  mild  type,  and  I  did  not  realize 
what  a  mass  of  suffering  and  cruelty  was  caused  by  this  poisonous  fountain 
of  evil. 

Of  Wendell  Phillips  it  may  be  said  that  few  men  have  so  quietly  given  up 
such  fair  prospects  in  life  in  order  to  give  themselves  to  an  apparently  hope 
less  cause.  Starting  in  life  with  the  fairest  hopes  of  success ;  sure,  through 
his  ability,  of  attaining  a  high  position  in  society  and  the  state,  he  sacrificed 
it  all,  and  never  seemed  to  notice  what  he  had  done.  He  thus  gave  another 
proof  that  the  spirit  which  actuated  the  great  religious  leaders,  Francis, 
Benedict,  and  the  Jesuit  missionaries,  can  work  as  effectually  for  humanity  in 
our  day.  These  saints  had  their  faults —  Wendell  Phillips  had  his  —  but  it 
was  refreshing  in  the  midst  of  our  commonplace  life  to  find  those  about  us 
who,  like  Sumner  and  Garrison  and  Phillips,  could  live  for  an  idea. 
Very  sincerely  yours, 

JAMES   FREEMAN  CLARK, 
MRS.  ELEANOR  F.  CROSBY. 


39 

BOSTON,  Nov.  21,  1885. 
MY  DEAR  MADAM. 

I  thank  you  very  heartily  for  your'  kind  note ,  and  if  it  were  possible  I  should 
rejoice  to  meet  the  friends  of  Wendell  Phillips  at  your  house,  and  to  do 
honor  to  his  memory.  But  on  the  evening  of  Nov.  29  I  have  a  service  at  my 
own  church  from  which  I  must  not  be  absent.  I  regret  that  I  cannot  meet 
Mr.  Weld. 

Qt  is  good  that  our  young  men  should  learn  to  honor  one  like  Wendell 
Phillips,  who  sacrificed  so  much  of  what  all  men  count  precious  for  humanity 
and  freedom.}  It  must  have  been  a  happy  life  in  the  consciousness  of  earnest 
purpose  ancTthe  consecration  of  splendid  powers  to  a  worthy  end.  If  your 
gathering  can  help  to  impress  the  power  of  his  example  upon  a  generation 
which  saw  little  if  any  of  the  best  work  of  his  life,  it  will  do  good  indeed. 
Yours  most  sincerely, 

PHILLIPS   BROOKS. 
MRS.  W.  S.  CROSBY. 

BOSTON,  Nov.  14,  1885. 
DEAR  MADAM. 

If  I  am  in  the  State  on  the  day  of  the  anniversary  of  the  birth  of  Wendell 
Phillips,  I  will  do  myself  the  honor  to  accept  your  kind  invitation  to  be 
present  at  your  residence,  when  his  life  will  be  brought  in  remembrance  ;  and 
I  desire  to  say  that  nothing  will  give  me  greater  or  more  sorrowful  pleasure. 

I  am  very  truly  yours, 

BENJAMIN  F.  BUTLER. 
MRS.  W.  SUMNER  CROSBY. 


Nov.  22,  1885. 
MY  DEAR  MRS.  CROSBY. 

I  am  very  sorry  that  I  cannot  accept  your  very  kind  invitation  for  Nov. 
29.  But  as  that  is  the  date  of  my  father's  and  my  own  birthday,  we  shall  be 
celebrating  it  at  home. 

My  father's  round  of  pleasures  is  now  such  a  very  small  one  that  I  can 
not  lessen  it  on  that  occasion  by  absence,  much  as  I  should  enjoy  paying 
my  tribute  of  respect  to  dear  and  honored  Wendell  Phillips. 

Very  truly  yours, 

L.  M.  ALCOTT. 


CAMBRIDGE,  Nov.  15,  1885. 
DEAR  MRS.  CROSBY. 

I  should  be  glad  to  join  in  the  celebration  of  Mr.  Phillips's  birthday,  but 
have  a  previous  engagement  that  will  render  it  impossible.  His  name  will 
have  permanent  fame,  and  his  birthday  should  be  remembered. 

Yours  very  truly, 

T.  W.  HIGGINSON. 


40     , 

THE  PILOT  EDITORIAL  ROOMS, 

Nov.  21,  1885. 
DEAR  MADAM. 

I  thank  you  for  your  kind  invitation,  and  I  deeply  regret  that  I  cannot 
accept  it.  But  I  am  engaged  to  lecture  in  Cambridge  on  that  evening.  Will 
you  be  so  kind  as  to  let  Mr.  Weld  know  how  sorry  I  am  that  I  cannot  meet 
him  and  hear  him  talk  on  Wendell  Phillips's  work. 

It  is    pleasant  and    honorable    to    be   remembered  in  connection  with 
Wendell  Phillips,  and  I  thank  you  much,  dear  Madam,  for  the  association. 
I  am  very  truly  yours, 

JOHN   BOYLE]  O'REILLY. 
MRS.  ELEANOR  F.  CROSBY. 


DEAR  MRS.  CROSBY. 

You  are  very  kind  to  remember  me,  and  ask  me  to  meet  the  friends  of  the 
noble  man  we  delight  to  honor.  To  hear  Mr.  Weld  is  always  a  great  treat, 
but  I  regret  to  be  obliged  to  lose  that  pleasure  now.  I  am  going  away .... 
and  shall  not  return  before  Monday.  I  am  sure  you  will  be  surrounded 
by  a  goodly  company  in  the  body  and  out  of  the  body,  and  I  trust  it  will 
be  a  memorable  and  delightful  reunion.  I  know  I  shall  say,  "  I  would  I 
had  been  there,"  but  it  cannot  be. 

Yours  very  truly, 

EDNAH  D.  CHEENEY. 

Letters  were  also  received  from 

THE  REV.  E.  EVERETT  HALE, 

MRS.  SAMUEL  E.  SEWALL, 

MR.  WILLIAM  I.  BOWDITCH, 

MR.  AARON  M.  POWELL, 

MRS.  MARY  A.  LIVERMORE, 

MRS.  JULIA  WARD  HOWE, 

HON.  JOHN  D.  LONG, 

MR.  EDWARD  M.  DAVIS  (of  Philadelphia). 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  bo0k»«po  tmbini  m  liimiPlilMaSre~.il. 


JW7    '67 -1M 
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University  of  California 
Berkeley 


GENERAL  LIBRARY  -  U.C.  BERKELEY 


